The Abduction and Murder of Captain William Morgan

The Abduction and Murder of Captain William Morgan

In March 1826 Morgan formed a partnership with David C. Miller,
John Davids, and Russel Dyer. Miller, who had taken only the
first Masonic Degree (Morgan was Royal Arch), was a printer
and publisher of the Batavia Republican Advocate. Like Morgan
Miller sought profit, but in addition he was infuriated by the
establishment of a rival local newspaper, the Peoples Press, whose
editors were Masons. David and Dyer were to furnish capital for
the publication.

News of this enterprise spread quickly among Masons
of the towns and villages throughout the Burned-over District- Rochester,
Buffalo, Lockport, Canadaiga, LeRoy, and Lewiston. These Masons
not realizing that published exposes were commonplace in England
and France were available in the United States, and knowingly
only that to write and publish such secrets was a heinous offense
in light of Masonic tradition, determined to prevent the books publication.
Morgan and his partners received various threats and were constantly
harassed, but the book appeared nevertheless.

On August 4 Morgan's
partners drew up a bond for $500,000, which the author was to
receive in exchange for his manuscript. The bond evidently was
worthless, for two days later he wrote his partners and charged them
with evasion and dishonesty. Amid rumors, puported violence, and
intrigue, Morgans book received a copyright on August 14 under the
title Illustrations of Masonry, By One Of The Fraternity Who Has
Devoted Thirty Years to the Subject. It was detailed and, by all
accounts, accurate narrative of three Blue Lodge degrees as then
conferred in New York, giving all the secret signs, passwords,
obligations, and grips, and was replete with woodcut illustrations.
When Miller advertised the book for sale at one dollar a copy
in the Republican Advocate on December 14 (after Morgans
abduction), its content included an introduction by the printer
that denounced Masonry in scathing terms.

In mid-September 1826 local Masons began to take direct
action against Morgan, hoping to stop the books appearance.
On September 10, an unsuccessful attempt was made to
destroy Miller's print shop by fire. Prominent Masons in
Batavia later offered a reward of $100 if it could be proved
that any of the bretheren were responsible. That same day,
Nicholas Cheseboro, master (head) of Ontario Master's
Lodge at Canandaiga, obtained a warrant for Morgan's
arrest on a charge of theft, claiming that he had stolen
a shirt and cravat from a local tavern keeper, from whom
he had rented a room in May 1826. The following day,
a constable (who was not a Mason) and five others
who were lodge brothers journeyed to Batavia, arrested
Morgan, and took him to Danold's Tavern. Morgan was
then taken to Canandaiga on the theft charge, but the
magistrate released him because of lack of evidence.
He was rearrested immediately on the claim of $2.69 due
an innkeeper. Morgan admitted the debt, and the authorities
incarcerated him about 10:00 P.M.

The next evening, September 12, 1826, the Canandaiga jailer was absent. Cheseboro, with two
Masonic assistants, afer some difficulty persuaded the jailers wife to release Morgan upon
payment of the debt. Morgan was then escorted from the jail. About 9:00 P.M. a shrill whistle
sounded, and the jailers wife rushed to the window, only to see Morgan struggling with two
men and shouting "Murder!" A yellow carriage appeared, and four men threw Morgan into it.
The carriage went "clattering" into the night, and Morgan was never seen in public again.

Morgan's exact fate has remained a mystery since that dark
evening, for his corpse was never found. From the mass of
confusing and contradictory testimony, some obtained in
court, some given many years later in deathbed "confessions",
it appears that the approximately sixty-nine Masons involved
in Morgan's abduction had made an arrangement with Masonic
brethren in Canada by which Morgan was to receive a sum
of money (perhaps $500) and a farm on which he would live
out his days incognito. The plan collapsed, however, and
no satisfactory documented explanation was ever offered
by those involved. Morgan was apparently held a prisoner in
the French powder magazine at abandoned Fort Niagara. On
September 19, 1827, he was allegedly bound with weights
and thrown into the Niagara River (below the falls), near the
place where the river sluggishly flows into Lake Ontario. Of
course, this account is conjecture, for authorities never
located Morgan's body, and although his abduction was
ultimately proved in court, his murder was not. For years
it was rumoured that Morgan had been seen in Canada and
in more exotic places-in Smyrna in the Ottoman Empire and
in British Honduras. It was also reported that Morgan had become
an Indian Chief and that he had "turned pirate" and had been
hanged in Cuba for his crimes.

This writer agrees with New York's third special counsel of
1831, Victory Birdseye, that Morgan was probably murdered
by misguided Masons, who , when the Canadian deal fell apart,
panicked and decided that by getting rid of the author, they
would somehow prevent publication of The Illustrations. To
their chagrin, not only did the book appear, duly advertised,
in mid-December, but within a year, Morgan's abduction and
alleged murder had produced a violent moral crusade against
Masonry and an incipient political
party as well.

The Antimasonic Party in the United States 1826-1843
William Preston Vaughn
The University Press of Kentucky 1983.

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